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New Media Rights published a 6-article series all about Freelance Contributor Agreements! No matter what type of creative professional you are, it can be difficult to make a living as a freelancer.

"But don’t be too quick to jump at an opportunity to have your written work, photos, or video published. You want to make sure before you start working with the publisher that you have a written and signed contract that outlines each party’s rights and responsibilities." The series focuses on the importance of having an agreement in place if you're working freelance and producing content.

A lawsuit can consume vast amounts of time and money, and unfortunately is not normally something that can be resolved quickly. But the judicial process can operate much more smoothly if you are aware of what happens in the first stages and the consequences of not meeting the various requirements in the first stages of a lawsuit. The more you know upfront, the easier the path to resolution will be.

Executive Director Art Neill will be speaking at the San Diego Press Club meeting on September 12th at 6pm. The panel is called "Nuts and Bolts: Intellectual Property – Protecting Yours and Using Others," and will include a discussion of using third party content online, protecting your own intellectual property, freelancers’ rights related to unauthorized republishing of their work, and journalists’ and media outlets’ responsibilities regarding work sourced from third parties.

The meeting is being held at the Procopio building in downtown San Diego, and the panel begins at 6pm.

Assistant Director Shaun Spalding is speaking at the NLGJA 2018 National Convention in Palm Springs on September 8, 2018. Shaun will be speaking about freelance writer contracts, negotiating effective deal terms, and how you can protect your rights as a freelance writer.

The NLGJA Convention is being held at the Hotel Zoso in Palm Springs from Spetember 6-9th, and the panel is called "Get What You Deserve: The Journalist’s Rough Guide to Contracts and Negotiations." The panel is from 3:45-4:45pm on September 8.

Assistant Director Shaun Spalding is speaking at the Vlog Summit Social Media Convention on Saturday, August 25, 2018. He'll be speaking about copyright and licensing for online video creators and personalities.

The Vlog Summit is being held at the San Diego Convention Center from August 25-26th, and Shaun's panel is on August 25, from 10-11 am in room 32B.

The California Consumer Privacy Act of 2018 is a new privacy law that was quickly passed by the California legislature to avoid certain consequences of enacting a voter-approved state ballot initiative. While the law won’t go into effect for another 2 years, it is a significant shift in privacy law.

On June 11, 2018, New Media Rights joined the Electronic Frontier Foundation and the Organization for Transformative Works in filing a response to questions that the Copyright Office posed after the §1201 Anti-Circumvention hearings in April.

The Copyright Office inquired as to whether screen capture is an alternative to circumvention for educational uses of short film clips outside of the context of film studies courses. Our joint response reinforces our position that screen capture is not a sufficient alternative to circumvention for fair use of short clips of video.

On April 24, New Media Rights joined the Electronic Frontier Foundation and the Organization for Transformative Works to testify in support of a streamlined class 1 video exemption to the anti-circumvention provisions of the DMCA (17 USC § 1201).

Section 1201 outlines the DMCA’s anti-circumvention provisions that make it illegal to bypass technological protection measures (TPMs) (also known as Digital Rights Management (DRM)) that restrict access to copyrighted content. However, if the reason for breaking encryption on the content falls under an exemption to the statute, then the circumventor is relieved of liability for breaking the encryption.

“Yes, it is true that our society places a significant value in freedom of speech, but there is a point, however, where statements normally protected under free speech cross into the realm of defamation. So the first step is recognizing what defamation looks like.”

New Media Rights latest multi-part series for Forbes is all about enforcing your intellectual property rights responsibly. There are many types of legal disputes that you might encounter when you own intellectual property. While there is no definitive formula to solving every type of legal dispute, there are things you can keep in mind the next time you find yourself in a bind.

The first part of the series addresses copyright disputes, and breaks down some of the do’s and don’ts of handling infringement effectively. Often copyright owners don’t know what to do when they believe that someone is infringing on their work.

In our new book, we focus on issues you may encounter from the inception of your business to the moment (that hopefully doesn’t happen) you get a nasty lawyer letter for the first time.

You’ll learn how to form your business, protect your intellectual property, and avoid problems when launching your project. Taking a few simple steps upfront to protect your business or project can save time and money down the road. Don't Panic has also been used in undergraduate & graduate classes nationwide to teach business and legal concepts to non-lawyers. Professors can request a FREE evaluation copy

FINALLY, CLEAR ANSWERS FOR LEGAL AND BUSINESS QUESTIONS WRITTEN BY LAWYERS AND DESIGNED FOR CREATIVES

After 10 years of advising creators and entrepreneurs, we’ve kept hearing about the same unsolved issue from our clients...

Creatives want to learn the legal and business rules they need to grow and protect their businesses. BUT they don’t have the resources to purchase 10 different books, read 100 different conflicting blog posts written by non-lawyers, and then spend $1,000 hiring an expensive lawyer to summarize them all before they’re understandable and usable.

That’s why we‘ve created our Resource Library. These checklists, best practice guides, and videos are made specifically for creative entrepreneurs who want the right strategies -- laid out in the right order -- to legally protect and thoughtfully grow their businesses.

We realized there needs to be an affordable and accurate place to find best practice guides written by lawyers but designed to be implemented by creators.

We are supporting the Library with ongoing updates -- which means you get new, actionable content for as long as you remain a member.

You can directly suggest new additions for the topics we’ll add. YOU as members, dictate what is added to the library based on what YOU need the most.

SIGN UP TO TAKE THE NEXT STEP IN YOUR PROJECT, AND YOU'LL GET A GIFT WHEN WE LAUNCH...